KC's Kicking Blues

Once again, as in days of yore, the kicking game of our beloved KC Chiefs has come back to haunt them.

Just as the rest of the city, I was excited about the Chiefs first game of the year and could hardly contain myself waiting for football to return to our illustrious berg on the beginning Sunday of the 2012 season.

Watching the stealth bomber and its shadow don over the stadium made me chomp at the bit just that much more hoping against hope that we could rise up from the ashes of a mediocre 2011 and fry the Falcons right to the very bowels of Arrowhead. Sadly, it was not to be as the Chiefs bowed down in defeat, 40-24. Why would I choose to pick on the kicking game as the goat of this solemn thumping we took? I will gladly explain the theories behind such a bold statement as follows.

The first half of this game lived up to all my expectations as I watched Matt Cassel and the boys keep up with everything the Falcons could toss at them. When Atlanta scored a touchdown on their initial series of downs, we came right back and mustered a sound scoring drive right back at them. Their second set added another TD to their score but we answered them again with a field goal making the big board read 14-10.

After a field goal for Matt Ryan’s crew made it 17-10, one of our outstanding tight ends, Kevin Boss made a great catch when he hauled in a Cassel pass for a beautiful TD to make the score 17-17. To close the 2nd quarter, Atlanta made another field goal to march into the locker room leading 20-17. At this point it looked pretty good for our guys in red as they played rock solid offense and defense through 2 quarters of intense NFL pigskin action.

To me, that’s when the gates came crashing down. The first drive of the 3rd quarter ended when Cassel tried to convert a 3rd down try only to have his pass swatted down by LB Sean Witherspoon. That led to a field goal attempt, and in my eyes, the virtual end of the game when Succop bounced the ball of the upright missing his FG by a narrow margin. Not only did his kick swerve away from its intended course, he managed to kill the momentum of the entire team up to that point.

As I watched this play occur, all I could think was that this would come back to haunt us in some manner later on. Geez, I couldn’t have been more right, unfortunately. That did prove to be the fatal blow for our team only managed to score 7 more points and failed to stop the opposition from scoring 20 more unanswered points. Two interceptions, a fumble and several more blown plays were to follow in a most unseemly loss to begin the Chiefs season.

The kicker’s blues are certainly nothing new in the city of fountains as anyone with a memory can tell you. How many other times in the past have the Chiefs missed kicks and enraged fans to the points of wanting to run our kickers out of town on a rail? More than I care to remember. But hopefully there were many positive items we can take from this game to propel us forward further into our mourning but the kicking game would not be a highlight of the day.

One can only have faith that the good things our team was able to do will eventually be a dream come true for the remainder of the games that the 2012 Chiefs will play.

Follow @ChiefsInsider Tweet
WARPAINT ILLUSTRATED MESSAGE BOARDS:
Is Ryan Succop deserving of all the blame?

---

For all the news, notes and quotes on the Chiefs, visit WarpaintIllustrated.com

Chiefs Home | Latest News | Team Info | Message Board | Subscribe Now!